VAN VOORHIS FAMILY BLOG

final product

Originally uploaded by SisterPV

We finally got our Halloween pumpkin carving done. Ethan wanted to do a car pumpkin this year – and I think it works ok.

Pumpkin anyone?

Originally uploaded by SisterPV

The beginnings of our pumpkin carving.

Home at last

Originally uploaded by SisterPV

Summer’s finally home with us – still a little tired and bruised. Taking a few meds and we’ll take her back to the vet tomorrow for more bloodwork and follow up. She seems very happy to be at home and is eating and showing more energy.

Thanks for keeping her in your prayers! J

Just a quick note – Summer is at home now and resting. She still is very tired and her skin is very bruised due to the bleeding. We’re still a little worried about her and will watch her carefully this evening. She’s following me from room to room, so I know she’s happy to be home with the family.

I take her back in on Monday for another check up.

Thanks so much for keeping Summer in your thoughts and prayers. We’re so happy to have her back! J

Summer at the vet

Originally uploaded by SisterPV

Our sweet, hairy beast.

Picked up Summer from the overnight vet and transfered her to our regular vet this morning. Yesterday was a really rough day where we were pretty much told that if the internal bleeding couldn’t be stopped, she could bleed to death. Many tears were shed and we prepared for the worst.

Thankfully, she has started to turn around and is making progress and doing better. She was sniffing, licking and showing her personality again. After trying to figure out all the possibilities, they have pretty much determined that it was some sort of poison that she ingested – most likely rat poison.

She had ingested rat poison last year – ate a block from the neighbors garage, but we caught it immediately and treated her quickly and the poison never really got into her system. The joys of labradors – they will eat anything – and obviously, that neighbor – or another has put out poison again. Of all the people on our court, there are only a few that don’t have dogs. We’ll just have to really watch Summer when she’s out front with us and not let her run around visiting neighbors without us watching her every move.

She’ll be at our regular vet today and we should be able to pick her up tonight around 6:00 and keep her at home. She’ll have to lay low for awhile, she’s not totally out of the woods yet – but they’re thinking that she can be here and resting.

Appreciate all your prayers and support – we love this crazy dog and are so happy that it looks like she will be back to normal soon. J

Summer’s war wounds

Originally uploaded by SisterPV

Our sweet furry Summer with all of her shaved places from her shots, IV’s, plasma infusions and ultrasounds.

Hey all – thanks for checking in. I picked up Summer from the overnight clinic and brought her back to the regular vet today for treatment. She got 2 blood transfusions last night and ate some food and kept it down. She had a bit more energy this morning and had a little more color to her ears and gums. Her platelet level had dropped to 14% last night, but as of 2:00 this morning it’s back up in the 24% range. The vet will keep in touch with me today on her progress.

Since our vet doesn’t have overnight facilities for dogs to be monitored by vets, it looks like I may be shuttling Summer back and forth between vet/overnight clinic for a few more nights till she stabalizes. We’re hoping by early next week she’ll be able to be back at home and monitored.

We’ve shed many tears for our hairy little beast – and appreciate your love and prayers for her. I’ll try to keep this updated. Thanks much. J

Hey all – Thursday evening and I’ve spent 4+ hours at the vet/urgent care vet tonight. Our sweet little Summer is currently at the Urgent Care Vet clinic getting blood transfusions to get her platelets back up to par. They were at 18% tonight and she is bleeding internally. She pretty much had the energy to wag her tail and not much more. They think it’s some type of auto-immune disease that strikes female canines in this age group (3-4 years old).

Hopefully they can stabalize her and then we’ll figure out treatment from there. VV tears have been shed tonight for our furry part of our family. I keep reminding myself that she’s “just a dog” but we love her dearly.

Appreciate your prayers and concern for her. I pick her up at the overnight vet tomorrow morning and then bring her directly to our regular vet for continued treatment. I’ll keep the blog updated of her progress.

Thanks much. J

Back from the vet

Originally uploaded by SisterPV

If any of you wouldn’t mind praying for animals – we’d appreciate a few for Summer. Just got back from an almost 2 hour visit to the vet – where the vet is very concerned about her.

Her platelets are at 90,000 and they are supposed to be at 200,000. She got blood taken and 3 shots – they think it’s some type of auto immune disease. Hopefully with the steroids and antibiotics she’ll get her counts up by Saturday when we go back. Her little bandages are where she got her shots, because her blood isn’t clotting properly.

I know it seems silly to pray for a dog when there are so many other crisis in the world, but we’ve shed some tears already for this furry part of our family. We’ll keep you updated. Thanks. J